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For insomniacs like Jodie Chambers, getting a good night's sleep is a nightmare.
Key points:
- A clinical trial is examining whether a bacteria-based medication could help treat insomnia
- Some participants who took the medication during the trial slept better and longer
- The trial will be expanded to test different doses and include a larger group of patients
The 23-year-old began losing sleep in high school.
"It's continued into my adult life," Ms Chambers said.
"I've had to take sick days off work, I often find it very hard to have conversations with people and regulate my own moods.
"It really is a day-to-day struggle of trying to get to sleep, stay asleep and just feel alive the next day."
The Sunshine Coast woman is among about 15 per cent of the Australian population who have chronic insomnia, according to a 2021 report by the Sleep Health Foundation.
The report also found more than half of Australians regularly experience disrupted sleep.
Gut sleep connection
Queensland scientists and doctors have been exploring whether the human gut could hold the cure.
The Sleep Disorders Centre at Brisbane's Prince Charles Hospital has been conducting Australian-first human trials of a bacteria-based treatment, developed by Sunshine Coast-based biopharmaceutical company Servatus.
Servatus chief executive Wayne Finlayson said the gut microbiome was home to bacteria that stimulated the production of sleep chemicals.
"Things like serotonin … melatonin, and GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid) and dopamine, which affects your moods," Dr Finlayson said.
The team has been trialling introducing a combination of live, beneficial bacterial strains to the gut.
"Hopefully we can provide a mild treatment with human bacteria that you have naturally, affecting your sleep in a natural way," he said.
Hangover effect
Sleep Disorders Centre director Deanne Curtin said the trial has involved 50 participants with chronic insomnia.
"The initial results are very promising," Dr Curtin said.
"There's been some improvement in patients taking the live biotherapeutic agents.
"It seems to have improved the quality and quantity of sleep."
She said traditional sleeping pills tended to lose efficacy over time as patients developed a tolerance.
"People can become dependent on them," she said.
"There are also side effects and adverse effects, such as a hangover, groggy effect in the morning, effects on cognition and increased rates of falls in the elderly."
Putting unhelpful thoughts to bed
Clinical psychologist Amber Rattray said cognitive behavioural therapy was still the "gold standard" in treatment for insomnia.
"We might start with a focus on sleep hygiene ... so limit napping, get a routine around the time we go to sleep, relaxation strategies to calm ourselves to get to sleep," Ms Rattray said.
"Then we're looking at shifting negative sleep thoughts towards positive sleep thoughts and reducing anxiety about sleep, so we can actually get to sleep.
"If there are some initial factors, sort of a generalised anxiety or post-traumatic stress disorder, then obviously we need to treat that as well."
But she said medication had a part to play.
"If someone's caught in a chronic insomnia cycle, that can be really difficult to break," she said.
"So sometimes starting the medication initially to break that cycle can be incredible useful."
Dr Curtin agreed the "best evidence" for treatment was psychological support but said the majority of people did not seek help for it.
"So that's what we're really looking for here — an effective, safe agent that's non-traditional pharmaceutical that could be used in conjunction with psychology," she said.
The clinical trial will be expanded in coming months to test different dosage levels with a larger cohort of patients.
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